Stronger Encryption for Wi-Fi

sp00 writes "The first products certified to support Wi-Fi Protected Access 2, the latest wireless security technology, were announced by the Wi-Fi Alliance on Wednesday. The Wi-Fi Alliance says WPA2 is a big improvement on earlier wireless security standards, such as Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP), which hackers have found easy to circumvent. It includes Advanced Encryption Standard, which supports 128-bit, 192-bit and 256-bit keys."

Sssssh!

Please don't tell my neighbors about this technology. Thanks. :)

upgrades to old equipment

The real question is will the manufacturers come out with new drivers/firmware to take advantage of this new technology?

Re:upgrades to old equipment

Nope. They'll come out with new equipment, which we will buy. Sigh.

Question

I hear that the various encryption protocols are easy to hack. But what about MAC filters? They have the advantage of putting all the security work on the server side. And though MAC addresses are easy enough to spoof, you have to know which MAC address to spoof, and there is quite a large address space.

So, are MAC filters any less/more secure than WEP?

Re:Question

At first, you don't trasmit anything. (Since, as you point out, the whitelist would prevent the access point from responding to you, anyway.) However, you just listen to the existing legitimate traffic. Then clone your device with the same MAC as one of these legitimate (and already on the whitelist) devices.

AES protects entire frame

I believe the AES implementation they are using actually does encrypt the ethernet (MAC) address, unlike WEP. (See Tying It All Together in this article [windowsecurity.com] for corroboration of that.)

WPA2 with AES is the real deal.

Good

I feel I speak for wireless users everywhere when I say "Good". What more is there to say?

overhead

All these new ways of encrypting data over wireless is great. Security of data is a good service. But how much will it cost, do you need more expensive hardware to create such encryption, will there be a loss of performance and other related factors. These are important and must be tested before we start saying that wap2 is the world's greatest thing for wireless encryption.

WPA2?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't WPA2 just the WiFi Alliance being stuborn about what to call 802.11i? I mean, WPA was just supposed to be 802.11i minus everything that required hardware upgrades. WPA2 is just 802.11i, only not a real standard, ooh boy!

Re:WPA2?

Not exactly. Wi-Fi/WPA/WPA-2 are all industry standards based on the various 802.11? IEEE standards. The difference is that WECA (Wireless Ethernet Compatability Alliance) actually does testing rather than just publishing standards like IEEE does. In order to get the fancy sticker on the package you need to pay a couple of grand and get your product tested to the standards. The benefit of certification is that you have some idea that the product was actaully implemented to the standard correctly.

That said, WPA-2 provides basically zero benefit over WPA. WPA relies on the same RC-4 algorithm as WEP, but has a few patches put in place to resolve the problems it had. The most important one is using a new key for each frame. Given a choice between an algorithm that can be broken given 11MB of data and one that has no known attacks, do you think that it matters which you use to encrypt 1500 bytes? Not really.

The good news about WPA-2/802.11i (same thing, just certified and a less scary name for the PHBs) is that it breaks hardware compatibility, and that means there's a chance that things have been done right this time.

"Easy to circumvent"?

All of the known WEP attacks are based on receiving weak IV frames (usually after sifting through gigabytes of data). Modern WiFi chipsets (i.e., those made within the last 2 years or so) do not send weak IV frames all that often, if at all.

It is not as easy as everyone says. Try it with some brand-new, high quality equipment and you may be surprised at the result.

Hmm

I doubt this is going to take off. Since we have enough problems with people enabling protection in the first place. Unless companys start requiring it, which won't happen because my local ISP gives you a wireless access point with service. But they do not enable WEP or any encryption on the devices.

Oh well mine is enabled

----
Free IPods [freeipods.com]

Re:Hmm

>Unless companys start requiring it

That's a bit out there. Do you really want the ISP doing what they think is best for you (or them)? "Oh, so you're running a webserver." Block port 80. "Oh, so you aren't using Microsoft's Firewall?" It gets installed by a tech and they charge you 50 bucks for the trouble, even though you have a hardware firewall, etc. Trust me, you don't want to be punished by rules set for the lowest common denominator.

The problem here is the problem we see everywhere when it comes to computers: usability. WEP is counter-intuitive to implement. WPA is a step in the right direction with a single password (as people understand the concept of passwords). The new MS wireless manager in SP2 goes a lot way to simplifying wifi also.

Make no mistake about it, there are lot of people who tried to get WEP to work only to have it fail. I know I've had bizarre issues with WEP that could only be fixed with a hard reset on the device and falling back to default settings, a firmware downgrade, upgrading firmware on the card, generating new keys every so often because the thing just didn't like the old ones, playing around with advanced wireless settings, etc. I don't think that level of troubleshooting should be expected from a typical end user.

So...

So now instead of just a few hours with a current computer, it will take a bit longer, maybe a week or something. Then someone will figure out that the key string is MAC dependent based on time signitures, or something, and there we go, no more security.

I have no illusions about the "security" of WiFi, no matter how encrypted it may be. The signal is traveling through open space for anyone to look at, and if you look at enough of the signal, you can find the pattern. This just increases the processing power needed by the AP and Card, further pushing the development of more advanced, procs. (Don't get me wrong, I'm all for this)

I understand that corperations are interested in this for security, but for an average joe like me, I keep my access point wide open for anyone to use. If you want to look at my GF's reciepe's or our photos, go right ahead.

Security is only as important as you make it to be.

Actually...

...keep my access point wide open for anyone to use. If you want to look at my GF's reciepe's or our photos, go right ahead.

Yesss.. that sounds like a great idea.

However, if you don't mind, I think I'll skip all the "take a look at my recipies" formalities and go straight to

- sniffing your email passwords,
- reading your email,
- sending email under your account from your IP,
- using your wireless access point to spam,
- surf some underage porn using your IP,
- seed my "next big worm" from your connection,
- browse/sample your internal network from the IP your WAP so conveniently gave me,
- and finish up by making various explicit threats against the president on the newsgroups while simultaneously using your cable connection to make VoIP calls to the NSA and reading them some of your previously mentioned fine recipes.

I almost forgot to say thank you for the free access point. Where are my manners...
;)

Wait...

Is this a software protection? A firmware protection? Will older devices be able to connect to WPA2 networks? That article is a bit... scarce on the details.

Why not get users to use what they have

Using 128 bit encription on most residental points will take several weeks of listening to break (correct me if I am wrong here) Shouldn't we concentrate on convinceing users on just doing something.

Re:Why not get users to use what they have

> on most residental points will take several weeks

Try months (and thats on old equipment with no firmware upgrade to filter out weak frames). Try not getting spotted sitting there with your laptop and running airsnort all day.

Do these WEP fatalists also refuse to lock their cars/house doors because anyone with some skill and one easily gotten tool can open their doors? Do these people also make their own padlocks in their basement because every manufacturer has a master key? Do these people also use blank passwords because cracking NTLM or most passwd files is very doable, etc.

AES is good, FIPS 140 AES is better...

If there's one place closed source is on the level with open source, its when the entire package has been validated by the folks at NIST under the FIPS 140 program.

http://csrc.nist.gov/focus_areas.html#cryptograp hi c

Flaw fixed?

One of WEP's biggest design flaws has been that all data is encrypted with the same key. Sure, there needs to be some shared secret for authentication, but the actual data transfer should use a negotiated key known only to the user and the AP. WEP is all right for authentication, but when it comes to security it's useless against other authenticated users.

It wouldn't be a bad idea to use something like this for non-broadcase Ethernet either, now that I think of it.

802.1x

Our network uses a 802.1x system with dynamic WEP keys.. the system requires you to re-authenticate (handled automatically by 802.1x client software) with a randomly generated key every 15 minutes.

What is the real advantage to WPA here?

Re:802.1x

Why not solve the problem by putting another line of authentication in place?

My school *shudder* has access points in many of the labs but after a student said he was going to "hack" into it there was a simple warning:

1. We know the MAC address to every computer in the building...
2. We keep logs of MAC addresses that don't match our set (apparently he went around reprogramming the MAC addresses to a now defunkt card maker's line for easy log watching, except for one lab which was un-re-programmable)
3. Breaking the WEP key is a crime, during the investigation we will try to track your MAC to you (hope you didn't pay with a credit card - your breaking into "protected" systems, in fact a federal crime)
4. You can't get anywhere, you must authenticate through the NT (blah) server for network access
5. It's pointless

Really, it made sense. He simply stated that there was no point in getting a signal without access rights. The man's first job was to secure the wired network. Once the AP's were put in, it wasn't a problem.

Could you run wild on your companies network by just plugging into the next available switch?

If so, fix that problem first.

Can we upgrade firmware ?

Or do we have to buy new products ?

I'm finding those wireless encryption thing to be a load of bullshit.

It seems like everytime they finally seem to get the crypto part down (WPA), we get something new (WPA2). I think I'll wait for WPA12938491849034 before upgrading any of my hardware.

Thankfully we have IPsec. (if only the OS-X version didn't suck so much)

Sunny Dubey

hers the deal

WPA-2 with AES 256bit encryption and Protected Extensible authentication protocol (PEAP).

Deal.

I still prefer a wired connection.

Pointless..

As long as these acess points are shipped with encryption turned *OFF* by default this is like pissing in the wind. It could be 1 billion bit one time pads and woulnd't make any difference. In my neighboorhood there are 10 unencrypted networks....all on the default channels. Out of the box straight onto the network is how they are set up. Joe Sixpack doesn't have time to deal with encryption.

*don't worry much residential war drivers..there will still be free lunch for a long time to come... /-McK

Re:Pointless..

Not pointless.

Even if it's turned off by default, the ability to turn on good crypto is perfectly useful.

Missing a point here...

People talk about WPA security and how it's important, but the fact is most home users don't even change the default password for their wireless routers.

So I have to upgrade...again?

So this means to take advantage of the latest security, I would again have to upgrade all my AP's and Clients... $ $ $ When will this whole industry be commoditized enough that we have 'soft' radios for wireless (Like AC97 Audio) that allow us more flexibility in upgrading older hardware to newer standards? Heck, with a true soft-wireless chipset we could use one RF device for WiFi and Bluetooth and whatever they dream up next...

The real question now is ...

Are we for encryption ...

or against [slashdot.org] it?

Link level security is fairly useless.

Link level security is fairly useless. It's fine for the average user, but the average user doesn't know how to turn it on. It would be great if there was some kind of auto-negotiated application layer security. Like IPSeC that has the user transport a USB dongle with the keys or something. This is just frivilous.

WPA 2? How about WPA 1 support?

There are still so many devices that don't support WPA one.. Tivo, I'm looking at you. All this nonsense about a supplicant this and that. When is Tivo going to get on the WPA 1 train?

To me the chief advantage of WPA is a human readable password.

This one hasn't been

cracked yet!!! Estimated time to flaw; 30 days!

its about time

you guys can piss and moan all you want but AES is rock solid. This is a great solution for those who don't have time resources or knowledge to use 802.11x with RADIUS. Finanaly a secure encruption scheme for home users who know absolutely nothing about encryption and how it works. I give it 2 thumbs up :)

LEAK length?

How many bits is the Law Enforcement Access component of the key?

NSA Encryption Restrictions

I remember hearing that the NSA restricts the export of high level encryption protocols. Is this still in effect and does this new Wi-Fi encryption push the limits of this restriction?

WEP security

WEP is a LOT more secure than people imagine these days. Most AP's and clients refuse to use weak IV's making the statistical attack used by Airsnort and other apps effectively useless.

Theres a very small minority of people still using weak 64-bit ASCII key generator algorithms that were found to be only 21-bits of effective keyspace. These can be cracked offline in about 15 seconds with a single encrypted frame but other than that, offline cracking of WEP is still a hard thing to do (from a practical point of view).

WPA vs WPA2 ?

I just got a WRT54g router, and I'm using WPA-PSK / AES.
Of course, one week later, they release WPA2 ;-)

What is the diference between WPA and WPA2 ?

VPN

Why not just set up a VPN? For example, OpenVPN [sourceforge.net] is quite easy to configure and maintain, and also
allows for a variety of client systems to connect.

I'm thinking of setting up a small WLAN using old equipment that i can get almost for free.
I would just plug another NIC in my OpenBSD firewall and keep nothing but the necessary ports for the VPN open.
There's a broad range of encryption and authentication methods available, and if the one I use
would be too weak, I could just change to another one instead of having
to buy new hardware such as PCMCIA cards, APs etc.

WISP do not use encryption, but Corp America?

I had a buddy that ran his own WISP and he said most all did not use any encryption because of the CPU overhead and the loss of bandwidth. In Corporate America I cannot believe they approve of standard MAC filtering, WEP and SSID broadcast turned off. WEP is so bad I cannot recommend it to anyone for anything.

WPA and a long password are the way to go. 16 characters of mixed case with one number and one special character should be 99.9999 percent effective.

Watch my neighbours

I don't want my neighbours to find out about this. I have my access point wide open so I can watch all the exceedingly weird things they browse. And I am biding my time for enough users so that I can inject a bit of goatse.cx in there. ARRRRRRGGGHHHHH MY EYES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The really important question.

Will hardware and software makers actually make it easy to use the crypto?

If you use WEP at the moment, some operating systems will prompt you to enter the key. Not the passphrase, but the digested key. So even though I know the passphrase, I must type 26 characters of hexidecimal into my iPaq with a stylus. Linux is no better for wireless and the last time I looked required hex too. Linux is particularly lousy if you use more than one WLAN since all the dists I've tried only store the details for one of them.

It is absolutely ludicrous. XP doesn't do that and I doubt (though I haven't tried) that OS X would either.

Given that, it would not surprise me that of those who even know to enable crypto if half don't just give up or use MAC filters or no security at all.

My preference would be whatever standard they choose be mandated to use crypto by default - and by virtue of the even longer key length it will force software makers to improve their support for it.

Re:Does this means...

Depends on how motivated people are.

Re:WHY WONT SLASHDOT POST THIS STORY?

That's obviously BS - just look at who wrote it.
Lyons doesn't exactly have a reputation for writing accurate, nonbiased, intelligent pieces.

Re:WHY WONT SLASHDOT POST THIS STORY?

As slashdot is becoming more "mainstream" you can expect more fluff and less punch. Hell, half the "science" articles are just ads [slashdot.org] now.

Re:Does this means...

The number of bits used by the key is not enough to judge the security of the system. You could have a crap cryptographic algorithm or, more likely, a crap protocol.

Re:Does this means...

Sufficient for what?

Keeping a serious attacker away from your data, if it's specifically you he's after? Possibly not.

Keeping a casual war(mode-of-transport)'er out of your WLAN to stop him leeching your bandwidth? Probably.